A bushfire evacuation story from Coonabarabran

14/01/2013 , 10:29 PM by Dominic Knight

The bushfire in the Warrumbungles, to the west of Coonabarabran, is currently an astonishing 40,000 hectares in size and has destroyed homes in the region. Dozens of people have been evacuated from their properties.

I spoke with Donna Burton, who lives 20km out of Coonabarabran, about her experience of evacuating at short notice after receiving a warning message on her phone. She and her husband had barely enough time to grab a few essentials before they left. She grabbed the washing off the line so quickly that she didn't realise she hadn't packed any pants!

Donna is Education Outreach Co-ordinator at the Siding Spring Observatory (pictured) which has been threatened by the bushfire. I spoke to her at the evacuation centre in the Coonabrabran Bowling Club where she had been waiting along with other families to find out whether their homes had survived. Many hadn't - at the time of writing, 33 homes have been destroyed by the bushfire. Donna was one of the lucky ones in that her house is still intact, but the fate of her stock is unclear. Like many people in the region, she is waiting for the all-clear to head back home to assess the extent of the devastation.